These days, it seems that outrage—and anger—is what sells. The main(lame) stream media is all too ready to produce stories which strike fear into the hearts of normal citizens, in a bid to foster some kind of outrage. Most recently, CNN published another of their (extremely slanted) op-eds, with the headline “Trumpesque alt-right nationalism must be defeated in Europe”. The author, Guy Verhofstadt, is a former Belgian PM and president of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Group (ALDE). In his piece, Mr. Verhofstadt writes:

For too long, in both the US and Europe, populists have gotten away with selling a retreat to isolationism and protectionism, wrapped up in a rose-tinted notion of absolute national sovereignty, as a solution to voter’s problems. Progressive voices must now challenge these assumptions and once again make the case for internationalism.

While one could argue that “internationalism” has been tried before on the Eurasian landmass in another form—which was also a transnational “union”—to disastrous results, this is not quite the kind of journalism CNN supports. For CNN, the panacea is to be found in strengthening—and not dissolving—the European Union. This is, of course, to be expected from a news organization which publishes a line like this: “The new divide in European politics is not between left and right, it is between nationalist illiberalism and pro-European liberal democracy”. While the divide is certainly not between left and right, this sentence certainly does present it as such while missing the point that nationalists need not be “illiberal” at all. In fact, nationalism may just be the one thing that can keep Europe together, given the increasing meaninglessness of the “multicultural” European Union which has enriched elites at the expense of normal citizens across the continent.

But CNN does not understand the unifying power that nationalism can provide. Indeed, in a late August Op-Ed about the tragic bridge collapse in Genoa, the headline boldly claimed that the collapse “shows what’s wrong with modern Italy”. Noting that the Morandi Bridge was badly in need of a makeover, the story quotes Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister—and “long-term EU critic”—Matteo Salvini as tweeting “If there are European constraints that prevent us from spending money to secure the schools where our children go or the motorways where our workers are traveling on, we will put the safety of Italians before everyone and everything”. While this seems to be a very valid criticism of the European Union project, the writer of the Op-Ed Silvia Marchetti was quick to dissuade readers from believing it. In the next sentence, the story follows Salvini’s quote with “But the truth is that the public funds earmarked to modernize roads or build new ones are allocated, but often never actually spent. The money is there, but we don’t know what to do with it”. Unfortunately, this type of pedantic reporting only serves to distract readers and shape their opinions.

A Typical Ad from Cnn.com. Here the goal is to encourage readers to choose the “summarize the news” option, which in reality just means a swifter form of indoctrination. As long as individuals stop relying on their own discerning analyses of the news–and instead outsource the “thinking” to CNN–then the world is in for a very dark future indeed. Image Courtesy of Cnn.com.

Instead of giving a fair presentation of a perspective which has validity—since the EU certainly does require states to not put their own interests first—CNN chose to further the globalist narrative (since criticizing the European Union does not fit the main(lame) stream media’s agenda). It would seem that news outlets like this would do well to learn a little bit from the football fans. In the wake of the disaster, fans of both Genoese teams came together to mourn. In a difficult time, the local identity of being Genoese—and Italian—was what brought people together, not the pan-European “identity”. If nothing else, the fans can perhaps be a model for politicians, reminding them that their most important job is representing their localities, their people, and their country. The European Union should be of a secondary concern to Italian politicians whose job is to ensure the safety and prosperity of Italian citizens, since all countries have the right to determine their own futures.